


Unchangeable

by orphan_account



Category: No. 6 (Anime & Manga), No. 6 - All Media Types, No. 6 - Asano Atsuko
Genre: Angst, M/M, Reunions
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-09 10:58:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5537378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shion has never heard of Christmas before, but Nezumi has. </p>
<p>Over two years after the events of No.6, Nezumi decides it's time to stop running away, and makes quite the entrance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unchangeable

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first multi-chapter fic... so I have no idea how long it's going to be or anything like that. Tags/characters/rating might change as it continues, I'll try to update often. So yeah, I hope you enjoy - if you do please leave comments/kudos! I'll try to reply to all of them; it's super motivating from a writer's perspective!

_It's not breaking a promise if it goes on forever,_ Shion tells himself. _It's not keeping a promise either_ ,echoes the darkest reaches of his mind. It's been two years. Shion is alive. Shion does not know whether Nezumi is alive. Sometimes he considers erasing his memory, but the words _disloyal_ and _traitor_ and _betrayal_ haunt the back of those thoughts like souls in purgatory. An oddly fitting metaphor considering that's what he has lived every day for two years. From a faraway onlooker he is friendly and functioning, albeit a tad shy and withdrawn. Someone closer would see that he has no friends, not really, no one he lets in. Each day is a routine, the only change being whether he is boiling with anger or simmering with regret. _I should have gone with him._ No. _He should have gone with_ me.He can't forget him - Nezumi is etched into his heart the way the scars are etched onto his body. Red, tinged with the memories of days filled with pain and fear, curiosity and freedom. Shion wants those days back.

As he stares in the mirror at himself, damp from showering, he mentally compares the reflection in front of him with what Nezumi would have seen when they first met, on the balcony, in the rain. White hair to brown, pale skin to tan, haunting gauntness to simple innocence. Scares mark his face now, his neck, his shoulders, his back. Sometimes, he tries to picture what Nezumi looks like. Has he cut his hair, has he kept it long? Unwillingly, he sometimes finds himself hoping that the boy with the rats hasn't changed much. He'd like to think _he_ hasn't changed much, but he knows he's stunted himself on purpose, stuck in the past gazing wistfully as events long past loop over and over. He knows.

Although Shion is past most fear - ever since the correctional facility, the piles of bodies; ever since he shot a man - there are certain things that are still able to make him freeze and break down like a small child. Seeing a rat in the streets (although he's not afraid of rodents) or the strike of lightning across the dark sky (though he's not afraid of storms) or a wasp mid-flight (though he's not afraid of bees) returns the sense of helplessness he feltwhen he first woke up outside of No.6. Shion hates the way he secretly wants to be protected again, even though he is long past needing to rely on others for his own physical well-being.

Tonight it is clear out; the moon is shining brightly through Shion's bedroom window and making his skin appear more pale than it really is. His red eyes stare back at him from the glass in front of him, unblocking, lashes clumped together and beaded with drops of water. His hair is longer than it should be, and thinner, the dark circles under his eyes manifestations not of insomnia, but of nightmares. Sitting down on his bed and leaning back, he looks outside to the deserted streets of No.5. The down pillows feel more brick-like than ever, the heavy concrete ready to suck him into whichever world his subconscious can come up with tonight. He had chosen No.5 because Safu had wanted to study here - it seemed the right thing to do. Not that it really matters where he is. His thoughts will follow him wherever he goes.

\----------

Shion opened his eyes the next morning - he was fairly certain he had slept through the whole night for once, but he had also fallen asleep undressed with the window open. He couldn't really find it in himself to care - he lived on a fairly quiet street after all, and --

What the hell was that jingling sound? Rolling over, Shion glanced at the clock - 8:30 am. Much earlier than he would normally rise, even on a day where he handn't been plagued with nightmares. Had the noise woken him up?Wrapping his blanket around him, Shion peered out the window - and consequently wrinkled his brow. Men, women, and children of all ages stood outside dressed in white and red, some with bells dangling off ofoddly shaped hats and some simply holding them. Their getup seemed impractical for the climate of No. 5 - nor was there reason to be so many of them this early in the morning. Shion rubbed his eyes and pinched his arm (not that he believed he was dreaming, it was simply a precaution). There weren't many strange happenings in No.5, so when a gathering like this occurred there must be some reason. Hurriedly, Shion dressed himself (making sure he wasn't wearing red in case this was some sort of gang or cult), and ran downstairs and outside of his apartment.

"Hey, um… what is it you're doing?" Shion asked as he approached a fatherly-lookingman.

"Sorry, did we wake you?" The man didn't answer his question, and spoke loudly over the jingling of his own bells, which he did not stop ringing. _How irritating._

"It's alright." It was Shion's turn to dance around the question this time. Repeating his former question, Shion met the man's laughter-line rimmed eyes. A spark of jealousy ran through Shion - that man had probably led a happy, fulfilling life. He probably had a wife and kids, had all he ever wanted in fact! He'd probably never been dumped on a pile of dead bodies, he probably slept soundly ever night! _Here it is,_ Shion thought solemnly as the wave of irrational anger rose through him. On the outside, however, he retained his composure and everyday facade.

"Why, it's Christmas of course!" Observing Shion's clueless, vacant expression, the man let out an exclamation of surprise. "You don't know Christmas?" He stoppedjingling his bells in order to scratch his five-o'clock shadow. "Oh that's right. You're from out of town, aren't you? Do they not do Christmas where you come from?"

Feeling color rising to his cheeks, Shion quickly shook his head no, hoping the slight breeze that hit his cheeks would dissuade the rising flush.

"Well, I can't say many people outside of No.5 do Christmas anymore. I'm fairly certain it's because a lot of the old religious texts are located right here, in our library!" The man's boastful tone irritated Shion, and he tried to hide his twitching eye with a crinkle of his brow.

"To put it simply, Christmas originally started as a celebration of the birthday of Jesus Christ. Except, well… no one knew when his birthday was, so they chose a date right around the winter solstice. That doesn't mean much around here, of course," he laughed.

_Religious… Jesus Christ…. winter solstice?_ The man's lack of clarity was making Shion all the more angry and he was starting to regret ever coming out here, despite the fact it would have been impossible to go back to sleep. He shoved his hands, which were starting to shake, inside his pants pockets and gripped the rough seams tightly. Gone were the days of dress shirts and sweaters - Shion rarely payed attention to what he wore anymore nowadays, neither comfort nor appearance wise. As long as it had some semblance of matching he would wear whatever came his way.

"Ah…" the man raised his hands as if surrendering, making those damn bells jangle again. Shion grit his teeth, nails digging into his skin beneath his trousers. Before he could spin on his heel and storm inside, however, the man decided to grace Shion with the continuation of his explanation.

"I should back up a bit, right?" He started, not waiting for Shion's answer, which likely would have been something along the lines of _No crap._ "Well, Jesus Christ was a martyr, as well the founder of the religion known as Christianity." Feeling his heartbeat slow a tad, the white-haired boy nodded his head. He had learned about Christianity in religious studies in high school, although the course didn't go very in-depth as to not show favoritism or bias towards one religion or another. "Christmas, Christian - all comes from the name Christ. The holiday started as a religious way to honor him, although in more modern times evolved into more of a commercial gift-giving day - like birthdays. People invented this character called 'Santa' that would come while children were sleeping and leave presents under an indoor pine tree with glowing ornaments on it. Of course, he didn't exist. But supposedly he wore red and white, and a hat kinda like this -" he gestured toward a nearby young woman donning one of the odd hats with bells Shion had seen from upstairs - "so we're being festive today. It doesn't really mean anything, it's just fun, you know? We're going to go caroling later - I found an old book of holiday songs at the university campus. You could join us if you want - I'm sure we have an extra hat somewhere."

Shion politely excused himself, saying that he had to work, and went back upstairs, shutting the windows and drawing the blinds. He would have to go back out at some point in order to maintain appearances - in reality he had Fridays off from his job at the clothing store a few blocks down. It wasn't very interesting work but he got free clothes and decent wages, which was really all that mattered. _Gifts, huh? Like birthdays…_ sitting back down on his unmade bed and staring at the wall, images of a sweater, of a story, of a small boy with dark hair and darker eyes, expression guarded, bleeding and injured and alone and soaked, crossed his mind. Of a boy, the boy named "Rat," that Shion would give clothes and breakfast and eventually, later, his lo--

Hands, his own hands, slammed against the side of his head, the _clap_ resonating throughout the room. Sitting there with his hands on either side of his head, trying to block the thoughts to _stop_ the thoughts to _erase_ the thoughts, Shion felt like he couldn't let go - if he did, he'd really be losing his head… and his mind.

He didn't know how long he sat there, but at some point he realized he was sitting in a dark room with his hands over his ears, hunched over with his eyes scrunched clothes. _Like a lunatic._ Not for the first time, he was glad he lived alone.

Nearly a year ago, Shion had left No.6, left his mother and the baby (now able to say "mama" and other simple words) and moved to No.5. He had thought that No.6 was holding him down too much, that he had too many memories that were associated with it that brought him feelings of hopelessness and helplessness. He had chosen No.5 for its connotations with Safu, and at first things had been alright. The nightmares stopped, he felt less cripplingly lonely and had felt like maybe, just maybe, he would be able to move on. But the nightmares came back, worse than ever, and the desolate isolation he felt persisted. In phone calls with his mother he tried his best to put on a front of contentment, but laying awake at night, waiting for whatever concoction his subconscious had created to swallow him hole, he wondered if he had really made the right choice by coming to No.5. After all, if he was to be perfectly, blatantly, awfully honest with himself, the fact of whether Nezumi would even be able to find him here or not plagued him like the devil.

_He's not coming back for me. He would have done it by now._

_But he promised! He'll find you, no matter what. He did the first time after all._

_Do I even want him to find me?_

_Does_ he _even want to find me?_

Most nights, he ended up thinking around this same circle over and over until he exhausted his own brain and was able to fall into a fitful sleep. Some nights were worse, horrifyingly realistic nightmares of abandonment would only prove his fears as he woke up drenched in sweat.

Last night had not been one of those nights. Ironically, it gave Shion a sense of uneasiness that he hadn't suffered from a nightmare; it was almost as if the universe was teasing him, giving him a sense of freedom from his own miserable mind before shoving him back into the turmoil. Or maybe the nightmare was going to be external this time - could the universe really be so cruel as to make him suffer in the real world as well?

All these thoughts looped his head as he came to his senses, daring to peer at the clock to see how long had been sitting there. It read 9:05 - he had only lost about

fifteen minutes thankfully. Rising, he pulled his hands off his ears, waiting for the buzzing to fade from where he had pressed against his ears too forcefully.

 ----------

After splashing some water on his face and eating his usual breakfast of toast with jam, Shion left the house to peruse town, collecting his paycheck and using it to buy his weekly groceries and personal items. He made idle chatter with several acquaintances and friendly faces - it seemed that besides the small group outside of his apartment, not many people were very into the Christmas thing. Though, he did spot the occasional "Santa" hat, and the stores were more crowded than usual with gift wrap strewn about.

By the time he arrived home it was almost evening, and in the fading light Shion almost didn't notice the plain brown parcel sitting next to his door. Almost.


End file.
